A Visit to Lapland. 373 



often very uneven. If no reversal is necessary this does not 

 so much matter, as the bottom glass can then be carefully chosen, 

 and thick enough to allow the upper one to be flattened upon it. 

 When, however, two thin glasses are indispensable, as for the 

 purpose of viewing both sides of an object with a y-g, -^q, or g-^-, 

 it is necessary to pick out thin glasses that will fit each other 

 with sufficient accuracy. The glasses ordinarily supplied will 

 seldom fail with moderate-sized infusoria, but anything flatter 

 than they are needs especial care. 



A VISIT TO LAPLAND.* 



Few regions of the earth exert a more powerful influence 

 on the imagination than those countries which lie sufficiently 

 near the North Pole to exhibit the remarkable summer pheno- 

 menon of an unsetting sun, and which are at the same time so 

 far removed from the regions of perpetual frost as to put forth 

 a vegetation beautiful in its flowers, and magnificent in wide- 

 stretched forests of the sombre fir. It is, indeed, impossible 

 to read of voyages within the picturesque portions of the arctic 

 circle without experiencing to a greater or less extent the 

 feeling so beautifully depicted by Longfellow in the fine story 

 of " The Discoverer of the North Cape," which he borrowed 

 from " King Alfred's Orosius." In that charming legend we 

 learn how Othere, the old sea captain, c ' had his heart stirred 

 up by the old seafaring men, with their sagas of the seas," 

 until at length he could (( neither eat nor sleep for thinking 

 of these seas," and then he sailed northward from his home 

 in Heligoland, and 



" The days grew longer and longer, 



Till they became as one, 

 And southward through the haze 

 He saw the sullen blaze 



Of the red midnight sun." 



Strange seemed the narrative to " Alfred, king of the 

 Saxons," and an "incredulous smile" played over his counte- 

 nance as Othere continued the story of what he saw and did 

 after passing the North Cape : 



" Four days I steered to the eastward, 



Pour days without a night ; 

 Hound in a fiery ring 

 Went the great sun, oh king ! 



With red and lurid light." 



The astronomical puzzle does not bewilder us as it did the 



* A Spring and Summer in Lapland, with Notes on the Fauna of Lulea Lap- 

 mark, by an "Old Bushman," author of "Bush Wanderings in Australia." 

 London : Groombridge and Sons. 



TOL. IV. — NO. V. C C 



